


Misunderstanding

by canistakahari



Series: in which Bones gets to Iowa in an unorthodox way [1]
Category: Star Trek (2009)
Genre: Character Study, M/M, Past Relationship(s), Prostitution
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-26
Updated: 2012-09-26
Packaged: 2017-11-15 02:24:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,898
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/522131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/canistakahari/pseuds/canistakahari
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>How <i>did</i> Bones get to Iowa if his ex-wife took everything in the divorce?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Misunderstanding

The first time is a total accident. A misunderstanding.   
  
Leonard McCoy—Lenny to his mother, Len to his friends, McCoy to his peers in residency, and not yet Bones to Jim Kirk—has just turned the apparent milestone age of twenty one.   
  
He’s celebrating alone, at a quiet, dimly-lit bar where everyone strives to avoid eye contact, because while he’s politely well-liked at the hospital for his competence as well as his slow, easy drawl, McCoy is also uncomfortably aware of the fact that most of his fellow doctors are at least half a decade older than him. He’s the youngest resident, fresh-faced and eager, genius-level IQ and high test scores getting him his internship, then his residency, easy as pie.   
  
However, despite the fact that his fellows joke with him in the cafeteria, and trust his decisions and advice, McCoy has yet to make a close friend at work. The gap in age seems too daunting to bother with, and McCoy has never really needed to pull strangers aside and blurt out that maybe sometimes he gets a little down, you know? He’s always been private. Discussing his  _feelings_  isn’t really the best use of his time when he’s performing surgeries and checkups; he’s comfortable with spending most of his hours at the hospital, and, occasionally— _hopefully—_ getting some sleep in the few that remain.   
  
But it’s his birthday, which means he’s finally  _legally_  allowed to buy alcohol now, so McCoy heads to the bar after the end of a long, soul-sucking shift, even taking the time to change into a clean button-down shirt (un-tucked) and jeans. Lately, he’s been sleeping in his scrubs, and wearing proper clothes makes him feel just that bit more human.  
  
McCoy is halfway through his second double-shot of whiskey, musing on the fact that he’s just twenty one, and today he had his hands in a man’s chest, when someone slips in beside him at the bar.   
  
“Shot of Jack, neat,” the man orders, then glances at McCoy. “And another shot of whatever my friend here is having.”  
  
The bartender moves away to get the drinks, and McCoy lifts his head from where he’d practically had his nose buried in the glass, surprised.   
  
“Uh, thanks?” he tries, unsure of what proper drinking etiquette is in such a situation. He panics for a moment, wondering if this man is someone he should know from the hospital, or else why the fuck would he be buying McCoy a drink, but the man leans on the counter, in his personal space, and chuckles.   
  
“Relax, I don’t know you. You looked lonely, here at the bar, though.”  
  
McCoy can feel the flush creeping up the back of his neck, but the bartender’s reappearance gives him something to focus on. He accepts the new drink, even though he hasn’t yet finished the old one, and raises it in a toast to the stranger.   
  
He’s taking a sip, when the man—anywhere between thirty and forty, classically handsome, dressed in a slick, sophisticated, well-cut suit—says, “You looked lonely, and I thought to myself, ‘I want to take that kid home.’”  
  
McCoy chokes. The whiskey is halfway down his throat, and it burns coming back up, until he’s sputtering and coughing into his hand, liquid dripping down his knuckles as tears well in his eyes.   
  
“ _What_?” he demands, his gaze briefly bewildered before turning to a suspicious scowl as he considers the man leaning against the bar beside him.   
  
“Cute,” says the man, with a smirk. “I bet you do pretty well, kid. So what do you say?”  
  
McCoy thinks, grumpily, that there’s probably a considerable chunk of this conversation that’s gleefully going sailing over the top of his head. But then again, he’s not stupid. He understands what this man is getting at. And besides, McCoy knows he’s not bad-looking. People like to flirt with him. It’s also his birthday, he’s alone, doesn’t have any friends, and he’s getting  _picked up_.   
  
“You always try’n charm strangers in dives like this?” he rumbles, swirling his finger casually around the rim of his glass and regaining some of his scattered composure.   
  
The man grins, sly. “You looked like you’d be the type to appreciate a direct approach.”  
  
McCoy stares into his glass, contemplating the sheer insanity of this situation. Then, he downs the shot in one long, burning swallow, finishes his double in the same manner, and gets to his feet. He hopes the man doesn’t notice him wiping his clammy, shaking hands on his pants. “Where d’you want to go?”  
  
“C’mon.”  
  


oOo

  
  
They end up at a small, cheap hotel, the kind where each room has its own door to the outside world, and the office is small and cluttered and manned by one elderly woman who is knitting an epic sweater and watching kitschy game-shows on her portable vidscreen.   
  
McCoy observes her, unseen, through the window, because he opts to wait outside as the man rents a room for them. He’s trying to give off the impression that he’s done this before, going with strange men to have sex in hotel rooms, but considering that is all a truly spectacular lie, he’s not sure if he’s at all succeeding. Still, the man doesn’t seem to give any indication that he’s not fooled. McCoy wonders if he’s married. Single men don’t take one night stands to hotel rooms.   
  
The room itself is small, cozy. There is a queen-sized bed, and a tiny, closet-sized bathroom. Above the bed hangs a canvas, painted with bowls of fruit.   
  
McCoy undresses in the semi-darkness. The alcohol is still burning through him, warming him, making him bold. He asks, “What do you want me to do?” in a voice roughened by liquor.   
  
The man smiles, slipping out of his clothing gracefully. He doesn’t respond, just pushes McCoy to the bed, spreading him out beneath him, stroking his skin, mouthing along his collarbone and throat until McCoy is hard and gasping against him, fingers twisting fretfully in the cheerful comforter.   
  
“On your hands and knees,” the man orders, calmly, palming McCoy’s hips.   
  
McCoy turns over before the man can see the hesitation and fear sure to be lurking in his eyes. He knows, from a technical standpoint, how this is going to work. He’s a doctor, after all. And he’s had adventurous girlfriends, who liked to use their fingers and tongues in areas of his anatomy that McCoy never would’ve addressed on his own. He knows, if this is done right, it will feel good. If he relaxes, adjusts, it will be the best sex he’s experienced thus far.   
  
He loses track of things, at that point. Because then he’s focused on his own breathing, loud and ragged in the small room, and how the man’s fingers at first are like hot brands, scalding as they move down his back, his hips, his thighs. They settle at his ass, and when next they touch him, cool and slick with lubricant, it’s a new sensation engulfing him as he’s stretched open one finger at a time. McCoy curls his toes, bites his bottom lip until it bleeds, and then comes undone with a low groan at the first brush against his prostate.   
  
It’s easier, then. The man moves into him, pushing, pulling, and clutching McCoy steady, fingers digging into his hips. His mouth is at the back of his neck, no doubt leaving a mark, and McCoy is losing his mind, completely wrapped around the rocking motion of his hips, the obscene slick-slide of the man’s cock inside him, how he whines desperately and shoves back to meet every thrust.   
  
He’s never come harder.   
  


oOo

  
  
When McCoy wakes, he is alone in bed. He’s wrapped in the sheets, sticky and heavy-limbed, and he lies there for a moment in a patch of sunshine, recalling the night before. He thinks, maybe, that he should feel empty, used, hollow. And, to a certain extent, he feels a little bit of all those things, but he’s also satisfied. Sated. He set out to do something he’d never done before, and he didn’t lose his nerve.   
  
He expects the guilt might hit him later, but for now, he just needs a shower.   
  
McCoy walks naked to the bathroom, too tired and hung-over to be self-conscious, and turns on the light. There is an envelope stuck to the mirror, bearing the hotel’s cheap letterhead, and he peels it off, not before noticing his reflection’s bed hair and the dark circles under his eyes.  
  
Inside the envelope is a sheet of paper, with two words on it: “thank you.” And underneath, stuck with another piece of tape, a credit chip.   
  
McCoy stares. And then he stares some more, a flush of sudden, sickening understanding creeping up his neck to warm his ears. He checks the balance on the chip and then his head is swimming, his mouth filling with saliva, and he vomits right in the sink.   
  
He’s just been paid for sex, he’s newly twenty-one, there’s a hangover headache building right behind his eyes, and Leonard McCoy can’t help thinking that the money will really, really help with his rent.   
  


oOo

  
  
The first time is a total accident. A misunderstanding. The second time, not so much.   
  
Leonard McCoy—still Lenny to his mother, still Len to his few remaining friends, “you prick” to his soon-to-be ex-wife, and still not yet Bones—has just signed his life away.   
  
His private medical practice, his home, his farm, his animals, his things—all outlined neatly in a stuffy, intimidating lawyer’s office on one innocuous-looking PADD. His wife’s lawyer had held it out with a grave look on his face, handing him the stylus, and McCoy had, helplessly, signed the bottom.   
  
It’s not like he’d had any other idea what else to do. It was best to just comply, and leave with his dignity still intact. If he’d stayed any longer, McCoy knows he would’ve lost his fragile sense of calm, given in to the well of anger damming up inside him for the last two years, and punched his wife’s smug lawyer right in the goddamned mouth.   
  
He goes to a bar.  
  
When he gets there, though, he doesn’t even order a drink, because, honestly, he’s got about twenty-five credits to his name right now, and he doesn’t want to waste them on piss-poor liquor when he might need the money for something more important, like food, a place to sleep, or…or transport.   
  
 _Transport_ , thinks McCoy.  _Ain’t that a rich idea. Where the fuck am I gonna go?_  
  
He’s got no idea what to do, where to go, but the other night he’d run into a Starfleet recruiter on the street who’d engaged him in a surprisingly in-depth and interesting discussion, and after finding out McCoy was a doctor, he’d outlined all the exciting new medical procedures they were testing out at Starfleet Academy. McCoy had asked questions for nearly an hour, the idea more and more appealing with every word that passed between them.   
  
He asks for a glass of water, and plays pool for a while, until the bartender starts shooting him suspicious glares, and it’s time to leave.   
  
Outside, night has fallen, and McCoy pauses under a broken streetlamp and stares up into the sky. He knows, without a doubt, that if he wants to try out Starfleet as a potential new career—a potential new  _life—_ he’d obviously have to travel in space. Shuttles would be involved, maybe even starships or starbases. He shudders briefly at the thought of all that blackness, that horrific sucking vacuum of  _nothing_.   
  
But then, there’s nothing left on this planet for him. Jocelyn’s got it all, now, and McCoy, when he pushes past his wealth of anger and bitterness, wants to go somewhere his skills are still needed, somewhere he can still be of help.   
  
The recruiter had told him there would be a shuttle to collect new recruits in Iowa, five days from now.   
  
He scowls, rubbing at his jaw, trying to remember the last time he had properly shaved.   
  
Twenty-five credits won’t get him to Iowa. Hell, twenty-five credits won’t even get him a decent haircut, but he imagines cleaning himself up is something he could do on arrival.   
  
It’s then, almost entirely unbidden, that his twenty-first birthday comes back to him in a rush. The embarrassment has died down, by now. He no longer feels shame when he thinks of how he’d guiltily spent the money, some on his rent and a little on himself. And because McCoy is feeling, amongst other things, numb and humiliated and, beneath it all, stunningly livid, he thinks,  _why the fuck not_.   
  
He buys a disposable razor and a bar of soap for five credits, a box of condoms and lube for eight, and shaves carefully in the bathroom of a fast-food restaurant. When he’s washed his face, and doesn’t look quite so haggard, he walks downtown, and picks a street corner.   
  
For the first hour, he feels like a damn fool. He can barely make eye contact with anyone walking by, it’s getting late, and he’s cold, and grumpy, and he can’t stop scowling indistinctly over the shoulders of every passerby. He’s surprised when the man approaches him.   
  
He’s a lot like the man that picked up McCoy ten years ago. Confident, handsome, in control. He seems to realize what McCoy is doing while no one else does, and at first they communicate entirely by raised eyebrows and gestures.   
  
The man calls a cab, McCoy gets in after him, and there’s no turning back.   
  


oOo

  
  
It’s a nicer hotel than the last time. A proper hotel, with elevators and electronic room keys.   
  
When the door shuts behind him, McCoy lingers by it, apprehensive. The man turns around, looking him up and down.   
  
“You look like you haven’t slept in a week,” the man comments.   
  
McCoy snorts. “Thanks, sunshine, you’re making me blush.”  
  
“Well? How much?”  
  
McCoy mentally tallies up how much it will cost him to catch a flight to Iowa, and hears himself saying, confidently, “For the whole night? Four hundred.”  
  
The man scrutinizes him for a moment, and apparently finds him satisfactory, because he shrugs, digs out a credit chip from his pocket, fiddles with it, and tosses it to McCoy. “Whatever. No skin off my back. Half now, half after.”  
  
McCoy eyes the chip, and pockets it, nodding. He can’t back out, now. If Leonard McCoy remains one thing, that is single-minded in his pursuit of getting where he is needed, and now that he’s figured it out, realized where he needs to go in order to keep practicing medicine, he’s going to go through with this again, and he’ll do it well.   
  
“What do you want me to do?”  
  
It’s a weird echo of a decade past, and McCoy shrugs it off along with his jacket.   
  
He takes a step towards the bed, and strips off his shirt.   
  


oOo

  
  
The man is gone in the morning, but the credit chip has the promised amount on it, plus a little change.   
  
McCoy isn’t quite sure how to react to the fact that he’s been tipped, but ends up laughing so hard his stomach aches, for the first time since the divorce proceedings started. He has a shower, gets dressed, and calls a cab to the nearest port, where he books passage on the next flight to Iowa.   
  
He spends the entire shuttle flight in a bathroom the size of a kitchen cupboard, throwing up into the refresher until he’s reduced to spitting and dry heaves.   
  
A week later, he decides his best course of action if he’s to survive the journey to San Francisco is just to stay in the bathroom from the start, so he doesn’t have to look out the windows, or think about being in a tin box held precariously in the air, but he ends up next to Jim Kirk, instead.   
  
He doesn’t throw up on him, but it’s the first time they share a drink.   
  


oOo

  
  
“Bones,” Jim says, half a year later. They’re sitting on McCoy’s bed, studying (or, rather, McCoy is studying, and Jim is entertaining himself by watching McCoy study), and Jim asks, curiously, “You looked like hell, the first time I saw you. Did you hitchhike to Iowa, or what?”  
  
McCoy blinks at him over the PADD he has in his hand, and says, deadpan, “Whored myself out for the cash to book passage on a shuttle from Georgia, Jim. I told you the ex-wife took everything in the divorce.”  
  
Jim’s eyes go wide in that special way McCoy has realized means ‘Bones-just-told-a-joke-oh-my- _God_ -call-the-papers’, and McCoy counts silently,  _one, two, three_ , until Jim bursts into bright laughter.   
  
“Nice, Bones, nice,” Jim says, wheezing with giggles. He slaps McCoy on the knee. “How much did you charge?”  
  
“Four hundred credits,” drawls McCoy, stretching out his legs with a soft groan. “Got a tip, too. Easiest goddamned money I’ve ever made in my life.”  
  
Jim keeps laughing, but he quiets after a minute spent starting at McCoy’s solemn face.   
  
“Bones?” he asks, eventually, blue eyes painfully earnest.  
  
“ _What_ , kid?” grunts McCoy irritably, tapping pointedly on the PADD with his stylus to show Jim that he’s trying to do some fucking work.   
  
“You’re really fucking weird, anyone ever tell you that?”


End file.
